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Friday, 30 May 2014

By Catherine Leining, Policy Fellow, Motu Economic and Public Policy Research

In the wake of releasing Budget 2014 on 15 May 2014, the New Zealand Government introduced the Climate Change Response (Unit Restriction) Amendment Bill directed at preventing “reregistration arbitrage” by post-1989 forestry participants in the New Zealand Emissions Trading Scheme (NZ ETS) (New Zealand Government 2014). The immediate passage of the Bill with effect from 16 May 2014 provoked strong protests and has implications for the future operation of the scheme. This situation highlights how a loss of confidence in Government rulemaking can weaken economic incentives for sound investment decisions.

Friday, 23 May 2014

Recent climate modelling research has found that countries
with high emissions of short-lived climate pollutants (SLCPs) should keep
mitigation of carbon dioxide (CO2) a top priority, and working to
reduce methane emissions in isolation will not be any more effective than doing
so in several decades time. In essence, “action on short-lived climate
pollutants will not ‘buy time’ to delay action on carbon dioxide”, says co-author
Professor David Frame, director of the New Zealand Climate Change Research
Institute.

Monday, 19 May 2014

Foreword by Catherine LeiningThis week, we feature a New York Times opinion piece, written by esteemed United States economist, Paul Krugman. He presents an argument for informing public debate relating to climate policy in a non-partisan way, using clearly presented economic ideas. While the United States faces more issues in navigating past political ideologies that distinguish themselves by proud defiance of factual information, New Zealand has also experienced its share of uninformed political debate and lobbying that exaggerate the costs and overlook the benefits of mitigating climate change. The most recent assessments from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change clearly reinforce that globally, the benefits of reducing emissions far outweigh the costs. In New Zealand’s case, we need to thoughtfully apply wise climate economics as we prepare our emissions-intensive economy to compete under increasing global carbon constraints and encourage other countries to take effective action.

Friday, 9 May 2014

A recent post by Catherine Leining, ‘The trillion tonne
challenge: Think cumulatively, act immediately on infrastructure’, explores the
significance of limiting our cumulative carbon emissions to one trillion
tonnes, and how keeping to such a target might be approached. But where has
this number come from? How is it calculated? And why is it such a significant
realisation when it comes to defining mitigation targets?

Thursday, 1 May 2014

By Corey Allan, Research Analyst, Motu Economic and Public
Policy Research

How should we compare efforts to reduce greenhouse gas
emissions across countries? The Kyoto Protocol focuses on production emissions,
which are the emissions resulting from the production of goods and services.
But what is the point of production? Would we produce goods if there was no one
to consume them? In a globalised world, production will move from one country
to another if there is still sufficient demand for the output. So is a country
really contributing to the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions as much as it
appears if their production emissions are falling, but their consumption of
emissions-intensive goods remains unchanged?

About this Blog

What are New Zealand’s possible pathways toward a global low-emission future, and what important choices lie ahead? This blog creates a forum for sharing information and perspectives about the mitigation challenges that New Zealand faces, the assets that we have, the solutions that might be developed or adapted, the lessons we can learn from overseas and the experience that we can offer to other countries.

This blog is part of Motu's Low-Emission Future project. See our about page for more information on the blog and see here for more information about the project.

The posts and comments on this blog are the views of the specific author; they are not the views of the author's organisation, other contributors, Motu Economic and Public Policy Research, the programme's funders, or the New Zealand Climate Change Research Institute.